Yip Yap Times

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2009-03-12T11:14:00.000-07:00

I have gotten some complaints about the title of my site. Some say it makes the content seem unserious and tends to make readers think of yapping dogs. My original intent of such a title was to highlight the yip yappiness of the Left and their nonsense ideas, and to include the term "yip yap" in every piece I wrote. I was trying to be funny but since I am not a humorous person (if I were, I'd be writing for Jay Leno), the intended humor never appeared. So, in the spirit of being more serious, but hopefully not grumpy, I have changed to a new site called the Duchess of Wonk. Please go there for future pieces. Thanks.

L

PRESERVING FREEDOM OF CHOICE—FOR EVERYONE

2009-03-09T17:02:00.000-07:00

“The civil rights of none, shall be abridged on account of religious belief…nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretext infringed.” James Madison before the House of Representatives, 1789

Last December, the Bush administration issued a new regulation that is intended to enforce federal laws that protect health care workers from discrimination and recrimination should they refuse to perform abortions or make abortion referrals due to their moral and religious beliefs.

But since good rules are made to be broken, the Obama administration will revoke the “right of conscience rule” after a 30-day period for public comments, also known as pretend-your-opinion-matters-to-the-White-House. In that spirit, I offer my two bits.

Far from being the cudgel that bludgeons health care as its opponents hysterically claim, the conscience rule does not restrict any health care worker in general from performing any legal medical service. Although there are several federal anti-discrimination laws dating back to the 1970s, the statutes have been hard to enforce on an individual basis. A rising number of reports of increasing pressure on physicians and other health care workers to compromise their medical ethics had prompted the Bush administration to develop the enforcing rule.

As expected, the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, NARAL and the rest of the little rascals have challenged the rule. They have made specious claims that the rule’s (allegedly) vague construction would not only deny health care to women, if you define abortions as health care, but also deny any medical treatment based on the provider’s personal prejudice. For example, a health care provider who opposes homosexual practice might refuse to treat an HIV/AIDS patient.

Likewise, reason the “pro-choicers,” it gives place to the prejudice of professionals to refuse to “treat” a woman infected with pregnancy—and that in contravention of the Hippocratic Oath. Never mind what the Oath actually says: “I will neither prescribe nor administer a lethal dose of medicine to any patient even if asked nor counsel any such thing… and reject abortion that deliberately takes a unique human life.” The critics’ fallacious reasoning implies we are too stupid to understand the subtle differences between death-causing diseases and life-affirming conditions.

Pro-choice doesn’t end with abortions. It includes assisted suicide for any reason and the “choice” of euthanasia. The decision to apply euthanasia is often made by people other than the patient.

A person close to me had a major stroke, but far from being comatose with signs of diminishing life, she was alert, moving, thinking and communicating. Her grown children decided that even if she were to recover, her quality of life would have been unsatisfactory so it was better to put her down.

She was euthanized by denial of food and water. It took her two weeks to die from thirst and malnutrition. Where was the Hippocratic Oath then? It seems to me it would have been more merciful to have smothered her with a pillow, strangled her, poisoned her or put a bullet in her in the head.

But that would have been murder.

If the healer is not the last line of defense for the defenseless, who will save their lives as pro-choice organizations attempt to wipe out all resistance in their mission to create a culture of death? We must defend the rights of people in the health care community to follow their consciences according to the dictates of the free exercise of religion. If we don’t we will castrate the power of one of our most precious constitutional amendments and open up the door to Hitlerian ideas of who is worthy of life.

Is that the change you want?

It's All About the "O"

2009-01-21T18:03:00.000-08:00

Who would have thought it could ever happen in our generation? The Founding Fathers probably never imagined it. Certainly our own parents never thought it possible in the near or far future. And now that day is here: the first Socialist/Marxist radical has been installed in the White House to rule the free world. (I bet you thought I was talking about his race, just like all the rest of the "colorblind" media.)

Dear readers, please forgive my curmudgenous posting. I guess I'm the turd in the Waterford punch bowl, here to rob the nation of its joy at Obama's coronation, I mean inauguration. USA Today described a humble scene: "For all the comparisons to Lincoln and Roosevelt and Kennedy this inauguration day, there was just Barack Obama, a slender black man in a dark overcoat." An ordinary man, humbly accepting the "hosannas to the king" of some 2 million fans as he made his grand entrance into Jerusalem, I mean D.C.. A donkey and palm fronds spread on the way would have made the scene complete.

Obama is the New Messiah for millions, perhaps billions, around the world. The Palestinians in Gaza believe Obama will bring lasting peace to the Middle East despite repeated failures since 1948. All of Europe thinks Obama will bring the dream of financial "equality" to the masses. The "human rights" crowd expect Obama to sign on to prophylactic abortion-on-demand, banish the idea of traditional marriage from the radar screen of civilization, and allow Auschwitz like experimentation on the stem cells of newly conceived babies. The "green" group hopes for the worship of their nature goddess. And the UN expects the USA will submit its sovereignty to UN rule under an Obama administration in the name of global cooperation.

Yet the new president has been sounding rather centrist since winning the nomination, even to the point of irritating his Bolshevik backers. So is he a radical idealogue or a political opportunist? I think leopards don't drop their spots. Melanie Philips of The Spectator (UK) summarized the phenomenon well: 'You have to pinch yourself - a Marxist radical who all his life has been mentored by, sat at the feet of, worshiped with, befriended, endorsed the philosophy of, funded and been in turn funded, politically promoted and supported by a nexus comprising black power anti-white racists, Jew-haters, revolutionary Marxists, unrepentant former terrorists and Chicago mobsters, is on the verge of becoming President of the United States. And apparently it's considered impolite to say so.'

Except for the probing of the vast right wing conspiracy, no mainstream media has examined his life. There has been no scrutiny on things like how he got into Harvard, what his birth certificate actually says, how he was elected president of the Harvard Law Review without having written a single article that anyone knows about, or especially how his voting record revealed his political philosophy. If the media had been doing its job instead of carrying on a long distance love affair with the man, the voting public may have seen that there was little in his life as an Illinois state senator or congressional member that would indicate he had any propensity for "change" much less action at all. He stands for the basics of Democratic Party left: robbing the productive to reward the unproductive for an ever increasing cycle of government dependence, the most radical ideas in the culture in death and subservience of American sovereignty to a global world order.

One thing we do know--he is a "brilliant orator." (Or if you're a brilliant orator who is a Republican out to deceive the masses, you're a "great communicator.") Obama's campaign of "hope and change" was absolute genius. He has made no promises, except to "spread the wealth." He has only remarked how bad things became under Bush despite such assertions not being believable under the blazing glare of the facts. The hope/change message means nothing except where the listener will fill in the blanks--or worse. Obama is really the Genie in the Lamp. And foolish people are going to be in for some bitter surprises.

Obama's inaugural address sounded downright right, even Reaganesque in its tone. But on second look, it was filled with chained-together bromides and platitudes more suitable for a Hallmark card. If you're a more suspicious person, you might not see a cute card but some dark meaning hidden in his cliches.

For example, in a recent pre-inauguration speech, Obama decried Bush's mishandling of the economy and how his new administration will inherit a trillion dollar deficit. That said, Obama went on to sell the idea of another trillion dollars to stimulate the economy. Somehow, the first stimulus passed under President Bush (by a Democratic Congress) was evil, only feeding the recessionary fires. But the next one under his watch is good, a solution not to be confused with throwing good money after bad.

Obama has also complained that Bush has made the US less safe. He will fix that with conditionless dialogue with our enemies who will sit across the table from our diplomats, wishing our death. Obama has complained about our bad standing in the world and our ruined relations with our allies. He will fix those with a new cooperation. That sounds like he will be giving away our sovereignty to his European lefty brothers.

I also fear Obama's "bringing Americans together" rhetoric. The entire basis of representative self-government is rigorous debate and disagreement. First, debate keeps the government too preoccupied to interfere with the citizens' pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. Second, rigorous debate hones solutions, even if one side loses its cause. This is not division; it is the American form of governance that has served us well since the Constitution was ratified--itself a "victim" of divisive politics. Does Obama really think he will get overarching agreement between lefty Democrats and what's left of traditional conservative Republicans to agree on diametrically opposed ideologic policy solutions? Does he think that half of the American people will stand silently by while the Obama/Pelosi/Reid triumverate smash the vestigial remains of the republic the Founders envisioned? If so, he is either counting on an impotent GOP to go along to get along--the beginning of a one-party system--or Obama will work closely with media, government agencies and education to suppress any dissenting opinion. The attack machine of the Left over the past eight years will look like a comedy routine compared to what Obama's media machine will do.

Obama has already betrayed his Socialist propensities when he told "Joe the Plumber" that he wanted to spread the wealth. This "new era of responsibility" simply means that the responsible wage earner will pay the bills of the non-earner, just like we are doing with the endless bailouts of everything under the sun. And the wage earner will pay through higher taxes and inflation, as his government continues to print the money necessary to pay for all this CRAP (Capital Rehabilitation Asset Program). True to the Socialist credo of a centralized economy, Obama's government will take over much more of the financial markets--all in the name of saving the economy--and severely diminishing its ability to create wealth. Obama and the Congress will regulate and tax businesses in the name of "green" and "transparency" to the point of paralzying entrepreneurship, invention, and job growth.

I paint a bleak picture. If all this is true, then why on earth did he win the election? Like I said before, he's the Genie in the Lamp. With all the promises of endless handouts and about 84% of the American people already on the mooch (analysis to come in the next installment), why wouldn't people vote for a Socialist? Having their lives regulated a la "Brave New World" is a small price to pay in their minds. Most will gladly sell their birthrights to freedom for a bowl of stew. What foolish people don't know, because most have probably not read the book, is that society became stratified, with only the wealthiest minority occupying the privileged top rung of society. The rest wallowed in increasingly subservient and degrading social positions with no hope of escape. So much for social and economic equality. But at least the government took care of the lower strata.

I'm not hoping Obama's presidency will fail. Conservatives do not seek failure like the lefties had done in their undermining of everything President Bush did to strengthen the economy, win in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to protect the homeland from another vicious attack. On the contrary, if Obama succeeds, we all do. But as a Socialist/Marxist radical, bastardizing the ideas of freedom and "human rights" to expand abortion on demand, the destruction of families and the next generation, creating an ever-expanding dependency on the government, and the depression of a vibrant economy through excessive taxation and money-printing, will cause his failure and ours.

Given some of his idealogic flip-flops, at least in speeches, I'm not really sure what to ultimately expect from President Obama. He has a long record of "present but not voting," a stern support for the abandonment of important moral issues, a healthy list of who's who in the Marxist crowd, a rhetoric for truth, justice and the American way, and an ability to backpeddle and keep his balance that would make circus performers jealous. He may be just as likely to betray his Bolshevik supporters as traditional American values. If the American people wise up and elect a dominant Republican/Independent Congress next time around, maybe we'll get more of the former. That's the kind of change I'm looking for.

Here's to hope.

Is the U.S. In A Recession?

2008-01-27T11:08:00.000-08:00

No, and we wouldn't be headed for one if Bernanke would keep his hands off the economy.

Even by the newspaper definition of recession, the U.S. is not in one. The media definition of a recession is a decline in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for two or more consecutive quarters. That has not happened. In fact, the economy is growing. The third quarter GDP for 2007, the latest round of reduced data so far, grew by an annualized 4.9%. This is up from the second quarter annualized growth rate of 3.6%, which is better than the 3.4% growth of 2006. According to my economics book (Economics by McConnell and Brue 2008), a recession is a period of decline in total output, income and employment. The downturn, which lasts 6 months or more, is marked by widespread contraction of business activity in many sectors of the economy.

Some economists prefer to look at individual indicators like manufacturing orders, wages, wholesale inflation rate, supply chain data and employment rate to name a few. Well, the unemployment rate is 5%, which is considered full employment. A rate like the 4.5% that we saw at the end of 2007 is considered a tight labor market--which could also be inflationary as wages rise. As of November 2007, manufacturing and trade inventories were up 1.6% over October, which was up .7% from September. New orders for manufactured goods were up 1.5% from the previous month. New orders for manufactured durable goods were up .1%. Here's the real good news: according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, non-farm business sector productivity (output per hour) was up 6.3% third quarter 2007. Hourly compensation was up 4.2%. That means labor costs were down 2%. In the manufacturing sector output rose by 5% and wages rose by 1.5%. Now before anybody starts yip yapping about how wages are not keeping up with productivity growth, understand that there are other factors that affect productivity growth. The main one is technology. Others include capital investments and education/training, all of which will make a worker more productive. The bottom line is--economic data is good even if the stock market waffles around wildly.

The stock market would theoretically be one measure of economic performance if it wasn't so driven by emotion and craps shooters. But since this is apparently the only measure Bernanke is looking at as he slashes interest rates, why is the market flapping around so? It all boils down to the subprime credit problem. The subprime defaults were a small, small problem in the overall mortgage market and microscopic in the total debt of the American consumer. The subprime fallout should have been limited to the people involved in this sector and not effect to any appreciable degree the overall economy. But the subprime got its tentacles everywhere because of collateralized debt obligations, or CDOs. The purpose of CDOs, like mortgage backed securities, is 1) to spread the risk around a large pool of investors and get it off the backs of the actual lenders and 2) make more money available for loans. These are good goals, but a variety factors affected their values. Many CDO products are held on a mark to market basis, which is the act of assigning a value to a position held in a financial instrument based on the price of the current instrument. The final value of a futures contract that expires in X months will not be known until it expires. But the failure of risk models used by credit rating agencies and failure to monitor credit performance by institutions that bought these investments paralyzed the credit markets because these futures contracts couldn't be valued. Major loss of confidence in the validity of process used by ratings agencies to assign credit ratings to CDO investments and cash flows led to a collapse of liquidity.

So followed the stock market. But the market was to see even worse thnaks to perosnal debt. Greenspan's monetary policy created the housing bubble. This was highly praised for boosting the housing and construction industry which was in turn credited with keeping the economy afloat after the Clinton years. But a bubble is artificial in that it must be inflated by something and so it was thanks to Greenspan's monetary policy of too loose for too long. Homeowners assumed that the equity in their homes was real so would never fall. They borrowed against the equity in their homes. Consumers maxed out their credit cards because the low interest rate lowered these rates. Sure, the economy could do well excessive consumer spending since 2/3 of the economy is driven by the consumer. But debt for that purpose is foolish. To borrow for investment is generally OK, but to borrow to consume and use up is just plain dumb. It drives the economy in the short term but eventually that money must be paid back. And ballons pop.

So followed the stock market. Bernanke has radically cut the interest rate. News media has reported that the "subprime crisis" has grossly affected overseas markets and investors in this country are losing confidence. The fear is that holders of American dollars will dump them and move to places with better investments. That would further depress the dollare and be extremely inflationary in the U.S. So, true to government bureaucratic thinking, Bernanke "did something." He cut the interest an unheard of 3/4 of a point. This has the effect of weakening the dollar and being inflationary. And it did nothing to help the stock market. Bernanke apparently assumes thought lower credit card rates will encourage more consumer debt and boost housing prices and get people borrowing against the equity in their homes again as prices rise due to demand because of cheaper mortgage rates. But the guy who lives according to his means gets rewarded with smaller earnings thanks to too low fixed income interest rates. So the Fed says let's just spend our way out of recession with even more debt than before that ended in threats of recession. There that ought to work.

We never learn.

Folly of a Politically Managed Economy

2008-01-10T08:37:00.000-08:00

According to the Bureau of Economis Analysis, United States real gross domestic product (discounted for inflation) grew by an annualized 4.9% in the third quarter 2007. That's even better than the 3.8% growth rate reported for the second quarter of 2007--good growth despite the ever weakening dollar and rising oil prices. Yet the media and various financial pundits relentlessly predict imminent recessionary doom due to the "housing crisis" unless the government steps in with a massive bailout for lending institutions and defaulting homeowners. The political pressure must be very great because even Fed Chief Ben Bernanke has succombed repeatedly to pressure to reduce the federal funds rate despite being the boss of a completely independent national banking arm. But the macro-problems of bailouts and Bernanke's thinking, beyond screwing people who have wisely adhered to the Shakesperian maxim of "neither a borrower nor a lender be," is the increasing tendency toward greater central planning of the economy.

On the surface, firms like Countrywide have laid people off amid losses and have demanded that the government (taxpayer) take care of their (irresponsible blunders) losses. Hedge fund managers are screaming about bankruptcy and demanding that the Fed drop interest rates as low as necessary to reinflate the housing bubble to cover their losses. The entitlement champions are shrieking about the difficulty of getting home loans and all the unfortunate Americans who will lose their homes if the government (taxpayer) doesn't pay for it. Isn't owning a home a right, they insist? No my children, it is a privilege and a great responsibility--as everything should be in a society where people want to be free to choose. Nowadays, responsibility for one's actions and choices is anathema to the crybaby '60's generation and the children they've raised.

The federal funds rate directly impacts lending and savings rates. If you're a borrower, you love lower rates; if you're a saver, you hate them. First, let's do the Reader's Digest review of basic macroeconomics. Economic growth in the U.S. is driven by consumer spending which accounts for 2/3 of it. So corporate America and the government want to make coming by money very easy for the consumer so that he can spend more. This necessitates borrowing more, unfortunately. When the consumer demands more, businesses produce more. When productivity goes up, the laborers' wages go up. To produce more, companies generally hire more workers. When demand outruns labor, the unemployment rate drops, prices go up and businesses make more profit, which hopefully reduces the unemployment rate.

The 17 rate cuts Greenspan authorized from 2001 to 2004 were intended to make money so cheap businesses couldn't refuse to borrow so that such debt would hopefully jumpstart the cycle I described above. But the unexpected consequence was the tremendous drop in mortgage rates that drove an almost panicky demand for housing. This was the primary factor that kept the economy afloat. However, it seems that the demand was artifially created because interest rates were too low for too long which created a real estate bubble.

Low mortgage rates cut into the profits of lending institutions, but because rates were low, demand for loans skyrocketed. I suspect that because lending institutions were earning volume based profits, due diligence for risky borrowers not only took a backseat, it ended up in the trunk. Lending institutions used teaser rates in adjustable rate mortgages (ARM) to entice subprime borrowers who should never have owned a home in the first place. But housing prices continued to climb and foolish people borrowed against the equity in their homes assuming the values could only continue to go up. When home prices dropped and the ARM reset--oops. You'd think that seasoned bankers, a normally risk averse bunch, would recognize that what goes up must come down. Now, finally, the banks and other lending institutions are tightening up requirements for their loans. Nothing like closing the barn door after the horse escaped.

Why are the hedge funds so upset? Didn't they hedge their bets? Let's do another Reader's Digest type of tutorial. In order to "create" more money for loans, financial institutions securitize loans. That is, loans are repackaged as investment grade securities and sold to investors. Due to the tendency of rating agencies to assign investment-grade ratings to MBS, loans with a high risk of default could be originated, packaged and the risk readily transferred to others. Hedge funds create "derivatives" which are financial instruments based on the value of their underlying assets. So, in this market hedge fund managers created options and futures contracts assuming that the underlying value of these securities would continue to increase in value. These kinds of contracts allow for leveraging, which is a fancy term for borrowing against an asset in the hope that it will increase in value and hence make more money that investing only what you have. To illustrate, say a homeownver borrows against the equity in his home and dumps the money into a stock market that has been bullish for a while. He is betting that the market will continue its upward performance and he hopes to make a profit several times larger than the debt on his equity loan. The hedge funds' lost their bets--oops. The hedge funds among others have continued to pressure the Fed to reinflate the housing bubble and the Fed has obliged despite the fact that bubbles do not promote economic stability.

Is a bailout good economic policy? Some commentators believe that any measure that keeps the unemployment rate low is good policy. But government regulation cannot take the place of the function of a free market. The free market is smart--it knows how to correct and maintain overall balance, even if financial measures fluctuate a bit in the process. Government involvement distorts the market and starts an avalanche of unexpected results that will take much longer to correct, if that is even possible as government solutions add layer upon layer of bureacratic sediment.

The so-called "housing meltdown" and "financial crisis" (and other inflammatory descriptors) only affects 4% of borrowers. That means 96% of borrowers pay their mortgages on time. The subprime sector has only a tiny affect on the overall economy in absolute terms but economists and financiers talk about the trickel through effect of losses on investors and consumers. For example, investors may want to dump stocks and consumers want to hang on to their money for fear of job loss and loss of home equity. Since the beginning of the housing bust we have seen instability in the stock market that many analysts say is a direct result of the "housing financial crisis." But the enormous majority of stocks in the market have nothing to do with the housing market or the lending institutions.

I realize that monetary policy is the Fed Chief's legitimate purview, but it seems that he is using it in a manipulative manner to satisfy the political pressure of the few but powerful that run a relatively small part of the economy. As Greenspan did, Bernanke uses the stock market as a measure of the health of the economy. The value of a stock is affected by its earnings expectations, which are also driven by "irrational exuberance" or irrational pessimism. This is the folly in using the market as primary data for policy formulation. Monetary policy is not meant to drive the market or bailout bad investments; it is meant to create price stability which is a major factor in earnings expectations. In the meantime, wise savers are are forced to subsidize the hubris of the mortgage industry in the form of crappy returns on fixed-income investments.

At the same time, Bernanke seems to be ignoring one of the most basic laws in free market economics: savings equals investment. I wonder how much the Fed would have been needed as the lender of last resort, or how much more money would have been available for loans to good risks, if the savings rate in this country was much higher. I suppose it depends on the government's fiscal philosophy. Consumption drives our economy; debt drives it harder, so let's "spend our way to prosperity." But an economy built on consumer debt and profligate spending is like a house built on sand rather than rock--makes an unstable foundation. I believe balance between spending and saving with less emphasis on debt will drive the economy just as successfully and without so many of the boom-bust cycles that seem to be increasing in frequency.

Is a bailout in keeping with the principles of self-reliance, responsibility, and risk-taking that built this country? I am sorry for investors who have lost money but that is the risk when one is looking for rates of return that are substantially higher than risk free investments like T-bills. In a free market economy there will always be good invesment opportunities but "you got to take the bad along with the good" as my mother used to say. Hedge fund managers who have lost a bundle in the subprime carry the same burden. It's too bad there are some who will lose their houses because of default, but as my daddy always said, "if you can't afford it, you don't need it." The lending institutions that have been making these risky loans especially need to suffer the consequences in keeping with the principle of responsibility. Responsibility is the price of freedom. Refusal to accept it is inversely proportional to the freedom we will have. Sure, it's tempting to demand government rescue as largess to be reaped at will, but we as a nation will have to pay the proverbial piper one way or another. We have to get control of the pervasive greed in this country and get back to fundamentals like "slow and steady wins the race" and flee the selfish "I'm gonna git mine and git it right now."

But the worst, perhaps even unconstitutional, government interference in the free market is President Bush's plan to freeze ARM rates as part of the bailout. The Contract Clause appears in Article I, section 10, clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution:

"No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, expost facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility."

The framers of the Constitution added this clause due to fear that states would continue a practice that had been widespread under the Articles of Confederation—that of granting "private relief." Legislatures would pass bills relieving particular persons of their obligation to pay their debts. Interestingly, with all the yip yap the Democrats have been doing regarding the unconstitutionality of national security measures and the constitutionality of measures no where mentioned in the Constitution, they disregard this constitutional provision that is written in stereophonic black and white and make lots of noise about how the president has not gone far enough. What is far enough--gifting defaulters their homes at taxpayer expense?

By cutting the interest to satisfy the few, wise savers are forced to subsidize profligate behavior found in both the financial institutions and the borrowers. Government interference in the free market in the form of bailouts foreshadow a possible paradigm shift toward greater central economic planning. And we know how well that worked over a 70 year period.

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Hillary's Tears

2008-01-08T08:47:00.000-08:00

The news media has been trying so hard to make Hillary Clinton look like she is either lacking in humanity or lacking in strength. Throughout her campaign, she has shown herself as tough and as articulate, if not more so, as any of the male contestants on the campaign trail. Though I am not a Hillary apologist--I am no more for her collectivist economic proposals or her lifestyle socialism than I am for Stalin's--I believe the questionable media attention she has received concerning her emotional state betrays an underlying prejudice against her as a woman. She has been called "mannish," "lesbian" for her persistance and toughness and "lacking humanity" for her straight-faced speeches. All these labels are intended to diminish her to the point of making her seem an unviable candidate. A label of "feminine" is not likely to be helpful either because the connotative definition of the word precludes such attributes as decisiveness, self-control and risk-taking that are reserved for the male character only. I guess that's politics.

So what happens if Hillary should emote more than usual, as she apparently did yesterday when she received disheartening polling news in the New Hampshire primary? Various media pundits swear they saw her get "choked up" and "her eyes glistened" (if you looked closely enough and used your imagination) and they have not stopped harping on whether the "tears" were manipulative or genuine. If genuine, has she demonstrated her humanity or has she shown the weakness that is assumed innate in the female psyche (that makes women unfit for leadership duty)? Or was she just calculating and manipulative? She didn't make anybody happy, but I guess that's politics.

This whole media debate about Hillary's tears is like debating the physicality of ghostly ectoplasm. Neither exists. She did not cry, tear up or choke up. She calmly, and dare I say professionally, expressed her disappointment in the polls. But can you blame the (tabloid) media for spending so much air time on Hillary's "tears" since they rank with the Kennedy asssassination in national importance? With only the Iranian threats against U.S. warships in the Straight of Hormuz , riots in Kenya, fallout from Bhutto's assassination, nuclear Pakistan, nuclear Iran, nuclear North Korea, more threats from Bin Laden, more threats from Al Queda in Iraq, Bernanke giving in to political pressure.....to report on, it must have been a real slow news day.

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Fed Chief Bernanke Succombs to Wall Street Pressure

2007-11-01T08:34:00.000-07:00

The consensus of the economists that the WSJ interviewed for today's Econ blog points to continuing the rate cuts. This latest cut was motivated by the expectations of “the market;” the stock market went up on expectations of a rate cut and Bernanke felt compelled to comply.

Although Bernanke has stated that there will be no more cuts for a while, he has shown that he will fold under pressure. The economists here, most of whom work for investment firms whose profits will benefit enormously from further cuts, are all pushing for more rate cuts. The opinions of these economists aren’t based on solid and well-rounded analysis of economic fundamentals, but are thinly cloaked petitions to the Fed for more cuts. The Fed is supposed to keep policy decisions close to its vest so as not to create information arbitrage for insiders, but obviously this isn’t true in the current Fed’s case.

Savings equals investment in the macroeconomy. It is investment that drives stable economic growth, while monetary policy is meant to keep temper inflationary pressures along the way. The current Fed policy demotivates saving because the returns are so low. The option for individuals and businesses then is to spend down savings and to borrow for more spending. This is the Fed's goal for driving the economy, but it is short-sighted. Eventually we have to pay the proverbial piper, as is now the case in the current mortgage market. But instead of letting the few problem hedge funds, lenders and borrowers take their medicine, Bernanke is reinflating the housing bubble that caused the problem in the first place.

The financially responsible and those living on fixed incomes will just have to tighten their belts further. The irresponsible will continue to spend themselves into bankruptcy with the belief that the Fed and the taxpayers will take care of them.

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Horrible Harry Was Raising Money for the USMC Law Enforcement Foundation

2007-10-25T06:12:00.000-07:00

(And if you believe that, I have some ocean front property in Kansas to sell you.)

A person knows his socio-political ideas are on the right track when he sees his adversaries following a perpetual path of prevarication to defeat him. Sometimes these heinous tactics work and sometimes they don't. When they don't, he can count on the opposition taking more desperate action, even violating the law, to win. Such was Senator Harry Reid's bolus trail when he tried to crush Rush. In his effort to smear Limbaugh as being anti-troop, Reid not only lied about Limbaugh's comments, he tried to bring the full power of the U.S. Senate on Limbaugh's head to silence him. As if this were not enough of an affront to decency, the disingenuous Reid committed another repugnant outrage after his plan backfired.

A couple of weeks ago, Rush drew Senator Reid's ire for calling a phony soldier a phony soldier. The "soldier" in question was Jesse MacBeth who had claimed he had served as a soldier in Iraq. He accused his alleged fellow soldiers of the most violent war crimes, like raping, pillaging, burning and murdering civilians and laughing about it all the way back to base. After some light investigation, MacBeth was finally forced to admit that he had never witnessed these crimes, had never served in Iraq and had never been in any branch of the military. His reason for lying: he's against the war.

Congressional Democrats are always trying to muzzle conservative private citizens. Limbaugh's preeminence in talk radio has been a wart on the collective Democrat backside. His exposure of duplicitous agendas and effective analysis of bad legislative proposals had galvanized Democratic "progressive" leadership to resurrect the long dead Fairness Doctrine. The maneuver failed and now, it seems, the Democrats have taken the brute force approach to shut down Limbaugh. The opportunistic Reid and forty of his myopic Democrat comrades had determined to deny Limbaugh his constitutional rights by demanding a congressional censure resolution against him. Reid and his Democrat minions wrote a letter to Limbaugh's boss insisting that Limbaugh apologize for condemning those soldiers who speak out against the war. They knew they were lying about Limbaugh's comments and they knew the truth about MacBeth. But the lies of their cause celebre made no difference to these nihilistic pacifists.

Lest we think that Rancorous Reid's attack on Limbaugh's First Amendment rights was the most outrageous thing he had committed recently, get a load of this:

"When I spoke to Mark May [sic], he and I thought this probably wouldn't make much money-a letter, written by Democrat Senators, complaining about something...The bid [was] more than two million for this... Never did we think that this letter would bring money of this nature... I don't know what we could do more important than helping to ensure that children of our fallen soldiers and police officers who have fallen in the line of duty have the opportunity for their children to have a good education." That was Senator Reid's naked effort to spin his anti-constitutional approach to representative governance by taking credit for the money raised by the Ebay auction of the letter. This is even worse than Al Gore taking credit for inventing the Internet.

Reid and his sour, mean spirited toadies lose; Limbaugh and the families and children of the fallen win. It's a shame that Reid, et al were not held accountable in the mainstream media for their total lack of integrity. But to any citizen who cares about the Constitution and the integrity of our elected officials, Rush says it best: "It got this kind of money because it represents one of the most outrageous abuses of federal power in modern American history, and that is what makes it a collector's item. This letter that Senator Reid wrote will forever memorialize him as a demagogue."

Reid Reid Reid Reid Reid Reid
Rush Limbaugh Rush Limbaugh
free speech free speech free speech
ebay ebay ebay ebay ebay ebay
letter letter letter letter letter
first amendment first amendment

Elvira Arellano and Illegal Immigration

2007-08-24T14:00:00.000-07:00

Everyone who is interested in the issue of illegal immigration has probably been following the saga of Mexican citizen, felon and illegal immigrant Elvira Arellano. Last year, she garnered the sympathy of the pastor and parishioners of Chicago’s Adalberto United Methodist Church as they rationalized giving aid to a lawbreaker as a poor Mexican woman who deserved a chance at a better life. They decided to protect them, forever if necessary, to keep her from being deported.

"We immigrants need representation," Arellano complained. “The millions of Mexican immigrants who are living in the U.S. are being treated like criminals. I'm not a criminal. I'm a mother who worked to support my son in this country."

Actually, she is a criminal. She had snuck into the U.S. twice, the first time in 1997. After being deported in 1999, she illegally crossed the border again—a felony that if prosecuted, could get her 20 years behind bars. She obtained work using a stolen Social Security Number—another felony—and had been fraudulently working at the airport cleaning airplanes. In a post 9/11 world, this should cause the Homeland Security agents to swoon in fear. She had defied judicial orders to appear before a court concerning her illegal status and had instead spent a year hiding in the Chicago church thanks to Reverend Walter Coleman. Despite all this and the fact that sanctuary is not recognized in U.S. law, ICE let her be while she remained in her hidey-hole demanding rights for illegal immigrants.

And now she is bellyaching about how U.S. immigration laws have broken up her happy family. She and her ardent defenders argue that because her son is a U.S. citizen, the U.S. government should not split up her family by deporting her. If family unification were important to her, she should have stayed in Mexico with her family. No one forced her to leave her son behind, this was her choice yet she has used him as a human shield to avoid deportation.

The Left is also exploiting this boy claiming family solidarity. The Left's claim to care about families makes no sense given its propensity to kill off children via abortion and promote homosexuality at every turn. But I digress.

“God wants me to serve as an example of the hatred and hypocrisy of the current administration," she told the Chicago Tribune. But thanks to the compassionate fair-mindedness of the current administration, she is now free to bring her son to Mexico to live with her instead of visiting with him through a plate of Lexan and telephone handset.

Notwithstanding all this, some clergy still choose to defy American law in the name of religion, claiming they are serving the poor and providing asylum to the refugee. At best this is grossly misguided compassion but likely these men of the cloth are mixing their politics with the pulpit. These compassion fascists refuse to accept that immigration law is intended to protect American citizens and provide for an orderly absorption of those applying to come here. America has always been the first to take in refugees from some of the worst holes in the world—Cuba and Haiti come to mind—so to act in civil disobedience as if the government were hunting down good and decent contrarians to a ruthless regime is not only wrong, but stupid. In aiding a fugitive, Reverend Coleman broke the law. But again, thanks to the decency of this government—decency to a fault—he will not be arrested or bothered in any way. Would he have gotten the same treatment in, say, North Korea, or even Mexico?

Business and politicians claim that illegal immigrants do the work no one else will do. While many claim that illegals help our economy because they spend money here and pay taxes here, the fact is that much of that money is sent back to Mexico to help support family members that just can’t seem to get up here too. Meanwhile, each illegal immigrant costs the taxpayer $22,000 a year. Despite efforts by the Bush administration to get the Mexican government to help keep its citizens at home, it really doesn’t have any incentive to do so. To wit: Mexico sends its poverty ridden and unwanted citizens to the stupid gringos in El Norte and gets foreign exchange in return. Hmmm. Low skilled high school dropouts or hard currency?

One might think these factors would be enough to get a consensus on the need to control our southern border. Instead, we see the power hungry political left willing to give away what America won fair and square in 1848 even as we watch, mouth agape, illegals protesting in the annual National March for Immigrant Rights and demanding rights and benefits and waving the Mexican flag as if the southwest was actually Mexican territory. Even while a few in Congress are working hard to create a real border between Mexico and the U.S., American business is in bed with many other politicians hoping to keep the border as porous as possible for that cheap labor.

While the bleeding hearts continue to bleat "unfair" in apparent hopes of getting into heaven and as our leaders turn a blind eye to all of this, one day an illegal border crossing much worse than Arellano’s will happen. Then what?

Elvira Elvira Elvira Elvira Arellano Arellano Arellano Arellano
immigration immigraton immigration immigration immigration
illegal illegal illegal illegal illegal
Left Left Left Left Left church church church church church

Credit Crunch, Credit Crisis or Just Desserts?

2007-08-15T07:20:00.000-07:00

Monday saw a dastardly drop in the Dow average after a very volatile week as turmoil in the U.S. subprime-mortgage shook investor confidence. Tuesday’s market dropped another 200 plus points. Disappointing behavior, but the good news is that yesterday’s drop was due to a less than stellar earnings report from Wal-Mart and Home Depot rather than more panic in the credit market. And we know that Wal-Mart will recover.

The big problem is not so much that some subprime borrowers are delinquent in their payments and may lose their homes, but the uncertainty about who is exposed to these losses. It seems the big hedge funds and financial institutions that were holding a large number of subprime mortgage-backed securities are the ones who are suffering. Their panicky response to the subprime market is causing fears to spread. Last Thursday the French bank BNP Paribas SA stopped withdrawals to the tune of $2.2 billion in three investment funds holding subprime mortgage securities, saying there were so few buyers that they couldn’t determine what these securities were worth. This decision richocheted around the world causing investors to flee from stocks and equity investments.

The American dream is to own one’s own home, but somehow this dream has morphed into a guaranteed right in the minds of some. Hillary and other Democrats are demanding some $1 billion in federal bailouts for those at risk of foreclosure. No one wants to see somebody lose his home; but many of those most at risk bought their homes with little or no money down, and so have very little at stake economically. A government bailout would send the wrong message—that risky borrowing will be rewarded by the government. Those who were wise in their financial decisions are in turn punished by the transfer of their hard earned tax dollars. To the extent that bad loans were made, the market needs to adjust, not be propped up by federal-aid programs.

Greed in the mortgage business overcame the fear that typically guides lenders into common sense loans. Subprime borrowers are typically charged 2 to 3 percent higher rates on their mortgages. Many subprime loans were made to borrowers without proper credit or income checks. Borrowers were enticed with low “teaser” rates in adjustable rate mortgages. As the rates rose and as housing values dropped, these same folks found it hard, if not impossible to refinance. The same judgment on borrowers also applies to the lending institutions. They have to take their licks and that may involve restructuring the loans of delinquent borrowers. This beats the costs of foreclosure.

Amid the market turmoil over leveraged buyouts, margin calls, redemption demands and applications for mortgage loans, the fed has covered liquidity demand. Still, the big and few losers in the lending business are trying to force the government's hand by refusing to conclude deals, make their margin calls and lend money even at higher interest rates. Since debt is the engine for the American economy, these players are claiming a recession unless the fed covers their losses and cuts the short term interest rate. Although the fed can operate as a lender of last resort, its primary dictum is to maintain price stability. Loosening credit at a time when inflation is a real possibility is contrary to that mandate.

It seems that Alan Greenspan’s easy money policy from 2002 to 2005 may have contributed to the current credit creeps. Alan Greenspan’s loose monetary policy was primarily based on the stock market doldrums. The multitudinous rate cuts didn’t boost the stock market so much as created a boon in the housing market, particularly new construction. As demand for housing grew because of extremely favorable mortgage rates, housing values jumped, encouraging people to use their equity as ATM machines. This is profligate behavior that is always roundly punished in the marketplace.

For those who fear recession and for others who fear they will never own a home, it is key to remember that the subprime market is less than 20% of the total mortgage market—and that is a generous figure—and only about 7-8 percent of these are in delinquency. It is a small number. It is miniscule in the total debt market and simply will not dampen economic growth. That is not to say that there won't be pain for low quality borrowers and subprime lenders, but for the overarching economy, it is a pothole. After the shouting stops, people will find that most mortgages were not problematic -- that while some lenders and brokers got too aggressive, the vast majority of loans will be paid off as usual. And hard lessons will be learned so hopefully America won’t see another self-inflicted problem like this again.

Tags: credit crisis credit crisis credit crisis mortgage mortgage mortgage
subprime subprime subprime subprime fed fed fed fed federal reserve
federal reserve hedge funds hedge funds hedge funds,

The Rose Ruckus

2007-08-12T12:56:00.000-07:00

Remember the old sitcom gag, done so many times, about the horny guy who dated several women at the same time? He kept them all in the dark about each other as he artfully (or so he fancied) juggled them until some snafu brought his philandering to light, sometimes with mildly humorous results. Just when I thought this hackneyed scenario had run its course, life decided to imitate art.

Enter stage left: Leroy Greer. He sent a dozen red roses and love note to his girlfriend through 1-800-FLOWERS.com and asked the online florist not to send the receipt to his house. Several months later, 1-800-Flowers sent a “thanks for your business” note to his address where his wife found it. Knowing she didn't get the bouquet, she called 1-800-Flowers who faxed a copy of the receipt and purchase order to her at her request. The purchase order included her husband's betraying note: “Just wanted to say I love you and you mean the world to me—Leroy.” He is now suing 1-800-FLOWERS.com for inadvertently revealing him as an adulterer. He is demanding $1 million in damages to cover his anticipated $6000/month in alimony payments likely to result from his impending divorce.

Isn’t that just typical? Don’t take responsibility for your premeditated choices—just make somebody else clean your spittoon. Whatever happened to being a man? His soon to be ex-wife asked the same question. Scribbled on the fax copy of the purchase order were these sage words:

“Be a man! If you got caught red-handed then don’t still lie. Your tmobile still has her number so why still lie [sic]”

The bad news for Greer is that there are no guarantees of privacy on the internet. Flowers didn't promise not to send a thank you note to Greer's home address. As far as they were concerned the customer, as determined by the billing address freely given by Greer, phoned for receipt information and the company was probably obliged to give it to her. Besides, what could customer service say?

"Sorry Mrs. Greer but your husband told us not to send the receipt to your house."

Even if the wife didn't pick up on that bit of innuendo, the florist still had the purchase order that may not necessarily have been labeled top secret. Just to be clear, Flowers did not promise to keep mum about Greer’s affair. He has indicted himself for steppin' out and he needs to take his wife's admonition.

The good news is that his law suit is likely to be dismissed. Fox News interviewed Greer's lawyer about the flower flub filing and even she laughed.

Tags: 1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Flowers.com
1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Flowers.com
Greer Greer Greer Greer Greer Greer
sue sue sue sue suing suing suing

Wren Cross Restored?

2007-08-08T09:27:00.000-07:00

As of last weekend, the Millington Cross has been put back on display in the historic Wren Chapel of the College of William and Mary. Is this a victory for the Cross and its supporters? It depends on your point of view.

The “Committee on Religion at a Public University,” University president Gene Nichol’s bureaucratic escape from the red-hot furor he created, developed a compromise that they hoped would quell the dissenters and save face for Mr. Nichol. The cross now sits in a discreet corner of the Chapel entombed in a glass case with a headstone describing the chapel’s Anglican roots.

Now that the Cross has been reduced to an inoffensive museum piece safely sealed behind glass, no prospective student will ever need to flee in horror to enroll elsewhere. The Cross and its conscience-touching aura that had been a source of death rays to the perpetually offended, is now relegated as a symbol of the past. But at least the cross gets permanent exposure to the chapel’s air space and for some, this is victory.

For me, nothing short of a return to the original policy prior to October 2006 is a victory. It is now clear that the battle over the cross was not just about the accurate portrayal of the College’s history and our First Amendment rights, but also about the spiritual symbolism of the cross’ placement. The cross was unacceptably offensive while it sat on the altar of a historic Christian chapel, yet in its new case it is deemed inoffensive despite now being on constant display. Its new display is inoffensive precisely because it makes the Cross a museum relic; a display that symbolizes the secularist shunting aside of God and makes clear to us social Luddites that the College and the country have moved on. I am saddened by this policy, not for myself, Christianity or God but for the misguided few who thought this was the right solution.

Fairness Doctrine: Trojan

2007-07-11T16:59:00.000-07:00

The Democrats have been yip yapping for some time about the dominance of conservative talk shows in the AM band. As explained in “The Fairness or Unfairness Doctrine?”, a few of the proud of the extreme left, comprised of the likes of Hillary Clinton, Dick Durbin and Diane Feinstein, have figured out what to do with the likes of Rush Limbaugh—demand the return of the old FCC Fairness Doctrine. This is the same Fairness Doctrine that lapsed in 1987 because it didn’t do what the FCC thought it would do: air both sides of a controversial story on the three available nightly TV news shows.

With the wide variety of media outlets provided by twenty-first century communications technology, debate should theoretically happen among broadcasts and print media. But with the playing field tilted almost vertical in favor of liberal news, we need a Fairness Doctrine to ensure that other viewpoints get a chance to be heard. But conservatives will never demand a fairness doctrine to level the playing field because they believe in the free speech doctrine.

Like dangerous malware buried deep in legitimate web downloads, the Democrats’ dangerous agenda behind their campaign to reactivate the Fairness Doctrine is buried deep beneath high sounding words like “fair” and “balance.” Thanks to conservative radio and the tiny number of right-thinking people sprinkled in the mainstream media, a huge segment of the American people understand the intent of the liberal Democrats’ sudden concern with media fairness. Couple this with Indiana Congressman Mike Pence’s Broadcasters’ Freedom Act and a sure routing of the Democrats’ offense to limit the First Amendment is all but guaranteed.

The party of the left knows it has no real justification to summon the Fairness Doctrine back from the dead. But they will do whatever it takes to be unchallenged, such as whining a lot or using a strategy of lies, bigotry, intolerance and character assassination. Cybercast News Service reported that the Democrats intend to push for the regulation by linking talk radio to hate crimes. They have requested a federal study of how licensed broadcasting facilities have delivered “messages of bigotry or hatred, creating a climate of fear and inciting individuals to commit hate crimes.” If your ideas aren’t acceptable to the ears of your hearers, then ram them in with federal chop sticks.

The predominant success of conservative radio hosts has resulted from the free market mechanism as many news analysts have explained. The failure of Al Franken’s “Air America” had nothing to do with denial of air time—it just sucked. National Public Radio would probably crash and burn too if it wasn’t getting propped up by the American taxpayer. Liberal talk show host Stephanie Mills told Sean Hannity in a recent interview that liberal radio is not failing in the free market. We had only to look at the success of her own show, about which she boasted a rating quadruple that of any other show, to see this.

“Why is radio 90% conservative and only 10% liberal?” she asked, implying the automatic success of any liberal show if it were allowed on the air. Lefties, being far too holy to understand the profit motive behind free markets, refuse to accept that liberal claptrap isn’t popular with the majority of radio listeners, and therefore it isn’t popular with a majority of radio investors. Her big idea to solve the inequity in the AM band is to force investors to air more Al Franken and go bust and be happy about it.

The liberal left is at war with the First Amendment. If liberal radio is so popular, then it is apparent that the Democrats’ proposed study of hate crimes in talk radio will be limited to conservative shows. The goal is to impose Orwellian “hate speech” codes on any media outlet or person that exposes the left’s true agenda. Ronald Reagan said it best:

“The framers of the First Amendment, confident that public debate would be freer and healthier without the kind of interference represented by the ‘fairness doctrine,’ chose to forbid such regulations in the clearest terms: ‘Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.’... History has shown that the dangers of an overly timid or biased press cannot be averted through bureaucratic regulation, but only through the freedom and competition that the First Amendment sought to guarantee. [The ‘fairness doctrine’] simply cannot be reconciled with the freedom of speech and the press secured by our Constitution. It is, in my judgment, unconstitutional. Well-intentioned as [the ‘fairness doctrine’] may be, it would be inconsistent with the First Amendment and with the American tradition of independent journalism.”

fairness doctrine
fairness doctrine

The Fairness or Unfairness Doctrine?

2007-07-02T08:50:00.000-07:00

Whenever you hear words like “fair” and “fairness” coming out of the mouths of Hillary Clinton, Barbara Boxer and Diane Feinstein you know that your wallet or one of your constitutionally guaranteed freedoms are up for give-and-take negotiations: you give, they take. This latest Democrat move to resurrect the Fairness Doctrine is nothing but an underhanded attempt to silence the opposition.

The Fairness Doctrine of 1949 was applied by the FCC back in the days when there were only three broadcast stations and the radio played only the top 40. The Fairness Doctrine was put in place to ensure that broadcasters presented a variety of views on controversial subjects, beyond their own. The FCC dropped the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 when it was found that it had the net effect of reducing rather than encouraging debate. Broadcasters tended to avoid controversy because they feared government fines and the potential loss of a federal license. The lack of real debate in the airwaves maintained the political status quo that was promoted by the print media.

With advancement in communications technology the Fairness Doctrine is an anachronism. It makes one wonder why the hard sell to put it back in place. The liberals don't lack for opportunities across the spectrum of American media outlets. They dominate the print media, the mainstream broadcast news, most of the cable news stations and the taxpayer-funded National Public Radio. How many conservative stations are supported by the taxpayer?

Clearly, the Democrats’ real target is to reduce the influence of the conservative voices on the AM band. The conservative radio talk shows have been so effective in providing fair debate to the Left’s ideas that Diane Feinstein has blamed them for the defeat of the immigration bill. That is, their unchecked bias was to blame and hence the need for “balance” on talk radio. Does Feinstein believe that all the rest of the comfortably liberal media was insufficient to loudly provide alternate views to those of a few radio shows? “Balance” is liberal speak for domination. The immigration bill failed because the liberals and their media lap dogs didn't have a leg to stand on and thanks to conservative radio shows, the American public found that out. Without conservative radio to balance the rest of the media universe, the American public will remain vulnerable to half-truths and flat out harmful liberal ideas.

The Democrats' sudden interest in fairness begs the obvious question: will MSNBC, CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, NPR, the editorial page of the New York Times and Bill Moyers will be required to give equal time to opposing viewpoints? Hardly. The problem is that the Left's 1960s nihilistic social and political ideology has been and will continue to be summarily rejected by a majority of the American people who, having suffered decades from the fruit of their policies, demand common sense and rightness in governance. Since the Left's ideas cannot compete, the left wing of the Democrat Party is seeking to use the power of the Legislature to shut down the competition. The First Amendment be damned, full speed ahead. If the so-called Fairness Doctrine comes back to life, what is to stop the Left from regulating the internet?

Thank goodness Representative Mike Pence (R-6th Indiana) is on his toes. On June 29, he introduced, along with 100 sponsors, the Broadcaster Freedom Act, a bill that would prevent the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine. Rep. Pence's legislation is critical to ensuring actual fair and balanced debate of controversial issues. To squelch conservative talk radio is to set the country up for extremely bad, and even dangerous, governance and it is un-American to boot.

The $67 Million Pants

2007-06-26T12:52:00.000-07:00

THE $67 MILLION PANTS AND TORT REFORM

The $67 million court drama of the disappearing dungarees ended this week with a judgment for the owners of Custom Dry Cleaners, Jin and Soo Chung.

The pants plaintiff, his dubious Honor Judge Roy Pearson of Washington, D.C., had sued the dry cleaners for $67 million dollars for the loss of a pair of treasured trousers he said he had wanted to wear on his first day on the bench. He actually cried in court as he testified of the emotional trauma of losing his favorite suit pants.

Thank goodness sanity ruled the court. Judge Judith Bartnoff of the D.C. Superior Court denied Pearson's claim and instead, ordered him to pay the Chung’s court costs. The Chungs still have to pay tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees. Their lawyer will request the court to order Pearson to pay these, but it's not likely the judge will comply since D.C. law has an "offer of judgment" that lets the defendants collect court costs but not the major expense of lawyers' fees.

This case belongs in the San Francisco Museum of Oddities, displayed as the Mother of all frivolous law suits. It is the classic poster child for tort reform.

It all started two years ago when Pearson paid $10.50 to have a pair of pants altered. He was mighty unhappy with the results. He charged that the job wasn't finished on time and that the pants he received were someone else's. He demanded $1,150 for a new suit; the Chungs refused. So off to court he went to sue for damages.

What damages were there outside of $1200 for a new suit, especially since the Chungs offered a settlement of $12,000 to end the law suit? It seems Pearson needed compensation for ten years' worth of weekend car rentals so that he could go to a different dry cleaner. He wanted $500,000 for emotional distress and $542,000 in legal fees. He was representing himself and charged $425/hour. Under D.C. consumer laws, he claimed that the cleaners' "satisfaction guaranteed," that omnipresent marketing slogan, was a fraudulent claim which entitled him to damages of $1,500 per day. Putting all this together, he calculated $67 million. Despite all the tear-jerking misery he claimed to have suffered at the hands of this dry cleaners, he magnanimously dropped his pants suit (no pun intended) to $54 million.

Why would a busy judge not toss such a suit out into the dumpster behind the courthouse? Of greater importance, what laws could allow Pearson to initiate such a ludicrous suit? The source of Pearson’s power came from consumer laws that allow complainants to multiply the stated penalty for a single infraction by the entirety of a business's clientele, or by all the days in the calendar, with no need, amazingly, to prove actual injury. How do you spell frivolous law suits? According to a June 18 Wall Street Journal commentary by Walter Olsen: “This sort of mechanical damage-multiplication has been a key engine in shakedown scandals in California (where roving complainants have mass-mailed demand letters to small businesses over technical infractions); in "junk-fax" litigation demanding billions from hapless merchants in Texas, Illinois and elsewhere; and in important sectors of litigation aimed at bigger businesses, including claims against credit-card providers and purveyors of "light" cigarettes.”

All of the above would go away if tort laws demanded a demonstration of actual injury. But the best tort reform is to get rid of all the lawyers. If that is not an option, then “loser pays” and rules to show injury to justify the suit would go a long way in stopping frivolous law suits and ridiculously high awards. Good for America, bad for the litigation lobby. Given the hundreds of millions of dollars at stake, the war for tort reform will reach epic proportions if it ever gets to the legislative battle lines. In the meantime, businesses will continue to pay billions in insurance premiums, doctors will continue to order costly and unnecessary lab tests and the consumer will continue to pay and pay.

Paris Burning

2007-06-09T13:13:00.000-07:00

Paris Hilton did the crime but almost didn't do the time.
(and still might not)

First the sentence was forty-five days in the Big House. Then it was reduced to twenty-three days, then three days and confinement to her posh mansion in the West Hollywood Hills. But then Judge Michael Sauer ordered Paris back to jail to serve out the entirety of the original sentence. Crying and shaking at the final bang of the gavel, she screamed for her mommy in court. “IT’S NOT RIGHT… MOOOOM.” The Theater of the Absurd continued as paparazzi chased the squad car that carried the bawling Paris to an en suite room at the Lynwood Sheriff Department Hilton. I can’t help but feel a little sorry for her because it’s like, well, having your sentenced increased after it had been decreased.

This fiasco of favoritism may just cause the Earth to tilt on its axis or cause me to agree with the “Reverend” A₤ $harpton, a first. And I agree with him that not just any old anybody—black or white—will get the special treatment that these celebs get, as Sheriff Lee Baca demonstrated when he remanded Paris to her LA mansion after only three days in her new gated community. Well, maybe confinement to her home would have been tough. After all, what could she have done about that ankle bracelet tan line?

Some legal analysts say the 45-day jail sentence was excessive and hence she received a harder sentence than a drug dealer or gang banger would have received in the same situation. But the initial sentence of probation and a suspended license was quite lenient given her .08 blood alcohol level DUI. Some 14,000 people die every year in DUI related accidents where blood alcohol levels were at least .08. But mercy often doesn’t soak through the hard skulls of the narcissistic and apparently Paris couldn’t comprehend the seriousness of her crime. She violated her probation, disobeyed the judge’s orders and violated the public trust, thus getting her a 45 day stint in the clink.

Sheriff Lee Baca’s Gerard Depardieu look-alike spokesman yip-yapped that Baca had the right to remove Paris from the prison for (undisclosed) medical reasons. Spokesman Gerard denied favoritism, claiming that any inmate with her medical problems would have been removed—yeah, if that other inmate is Mel Gibson, Tom Sizemore or Rosey Perez. Lee Baca also has a reputation for being moonstruck by celebs. Face it, he sprung her from jail.

Here’s a fiscally responsible idea. Fire all the judges and let the sheriffs decide the sentences. Despite having been overruled by a sheriff, Judge Sauer exercised patience in waiting for Paris’ medical records to justify the change in sentence. Baca never delivered. So, I have to agree with Paris—it wasn’t right to toss her back and forth like a football. And he is an embarrassment to the LA judicial system.

Well, don’t worry about Paris. Sure, it’ll be rough without her cell phone and blackberry, no maid service and no gift baskets. But no doubt the diary she plans to keep will be worth a million dollars in 45-minus-time-served days. For a person who didn’t even graduate from her highfalutin upper West Side Manhattan Dwight School, whose motto is to inspire students “to use their spark of genius to build a better world” (aka as the Drunk White Idiots Getting High Together) it looks like Paris done ‘em proud. Being a jailbird brings more dignified fame than that generated by an internet sex video. Besides, she would be a fool not to complete the time since Baca’s version of justice generated coast to coast disgust for her and her overstuffed life of lazy privilege. Now, at least, she has a chance to salvage whatever it is she calls a career.

The question remains: will she actually do 45 days? The Smart money is betting…you can figure it out.

Wren Cross Compromise, A Readily Invisible Place

2007-04-18T09:35:00.000-07:00

After months of debate in the hallowed bureacracy of William and Mary and cross words in the blogosphere and Virginia's regional newspapers, the two-foot Wren Chapel cross finally has a permanent, somewhat visible place of display.

You can find the Cross sealed in a glass box sitting in a shadow-swaddled corner. Well, not really. It's not clear when we will ever see this cross again.

The decision by President Nichol's hand-picked Committee on Religion in a Public University to return the cross to the chapel, albiet in an extremely subdued position, came about March 6. I honestly thought victory was at hand until I heard about the method of display and placement. And even this half baked proposal remained unfulfilled until this week when Nichol's propaganda machine, I mean Committee on Religion in a Public University, finally issued its edict about where the cross would go. For the last few weeks, the newspapers had raised suspicious questions as to the whereabouts of the little cross. The reason for the delay, said the PR works, was the controversial issue of cross placement. Now the delay is how to build a rectangular box in which to trap the cross's death rays.

It is amazing how such a small item can scare grown men.

Abortion: Love's Labor Lost

2007-03-19T16:07:00.000-07:00

Planned Parenthood continues its diatribe on the rights of a woman to her own body--notwithstanding that it's someone else's body they advocate killing; the employers of corporate America keep on yip yapping about the need for (illegal) immigration to balance the oversupply of jobs with the undersupply of labor; and Democrats and Republicans alike wring their hands over the drying up of Social Security.Whateva will we do? Whereva will we go? Frankly my dear, former Senator Zell Miller summed it up accurately:

“How could this great land of plenty produce too few people in the last 30 years? Here is the brutal truth that no one dares to mention: We’re too few because too many of our babies have been killed. Over 45 million since Roe v. Wade in 1973. If those 45 million children had lived, today they would be defending our country, they would be filling our jobs, they would be paying into Social Security. Still, we watch as 3,700 babies are killed every single day in America. It is unbelievable that a nation under God would allow this.”

The legislators and voters alike, bereft of the common sense God gave the sea cucumber, are seeing with blind eyes their country swirling down the drain. Oh yes, we as a nation are still unbelievably prosperous. But our wealth glosses over the rot underneath, disguising it as effectively as lipstick on a pig. We have tons of money now, but that will be the final thing that goes when we've finished losing everything else. America isn't the shining city on a hill it used to be, it's more like a penlight. Generations ago, the oppressed that gathered on our shores for a shot at a better life embraced the responsibility as well as the rewards of opportunity and freedom. They forsook the old country for a new loyalty to their adopted identity. Now we just attract the greedy and the hate-filled.

Rioters in Mexico and in East Los Angeles demanded the "right" for free passage in these United States and they waved the Mexican flag in our streets as if they were a conquering army. Instead of outrage, we got politicians and civil rights leaders defending these actions in the name of welcome, compassion and diversity.

And still we kill millions.

When the secular humanists want to strike "one nation under God" from the record and delete "in God we trust" from our currency, in a way they are right. As a nation, we are not under God, He is under our feet. As a nation, we do not trust God, we trust in ourselves. So why be hypocritical about these words? The nation has traded wisdom for foolishness, has advocated death in the name of life, has promoted sloth in the name of compassion and pushed anything-goes immorality in the name of freedom.

And yet so many Christians keep on going up the down staircase as if they had hope for a bright future for America. Yes, there is a bright and shining future. I believe in God's mercy, His patience and His strength and He has left Himself a remnant of the righteous in America that honors and obeys Him. And America is terribly, terribly lucky.

So fight on you enemies of freedom and life and all you who laugh at what is good, noble, pure and right. Beware: the remnant is praying.

Wren Cross Compromise

2007-03-09T10:59:00.000-08:00

It looks like the Battle of the Cross is just about over thanks to the face-saving March 6 compromise solution reached by Gene Nichol’s Committee on Religion in a Public University. They recommended that the cross be returned to the Wren Chapel for permanent display, just like the 18,000 plus alumni and supporters throughout the nation wanted. And Mr. Nichol apparently doesn’t feel the need to resign as he insisted he would do if the cross were restored.

It must have been an amazing stroke of genius on par with the wisdom of King Solomon to finally resolve the seemingly endless stalemate between the Save The Wren Cross folks and the Nichol camp.

So what exactly is the compromise in the compromise solution? I’ll give you hint: Something about it just smells like old farts. Read more.

Wren Chapel Cross Controversy Continues

2007-01-13T10:35:00.001-08:00

Mr. Gene R. Nichol, president of the College of William and Mary, removed the 18" brass cross from the altar of the Wren Chapel because a few members on the "diverse" campus--who still remain unidentified--were miffed there was a cross in a Christian chapel. Initially, he allowed individuals to return the cross to its place for specific meetings as long as they returned it to the designated closet when they were done. This was a reversal of the original policy which allowed for the removal of the cross during meetings that did not want it there as long as they returned it when they were done. Well, the new policy has caused such an uproar that Mr. Nichol was willing to allow the cross to stand for a few hours on Sundays with a lip-service plaque to be posted indicating the chapel was historically an Anglican place of worship (but apparently no longer).

It's awful big of this diversity-sensitive man to include a nod to the Christian heritage of the College, and as the "alma mater of a nation," by extension a nod to the Christian heritage of America. But this sensitivity cop is motivated by another agenda. Read the full article

Nichol Tries Compromise Solution to Wren Cross Mess

2006-12-22T17:10:00.000-08:00

December 20, university president Gene Nichol sent out an email to the student body and alumni of the College of William and Mary offering a compromise to the uproar he generated when he unilaterally decided to remove the cross from the historically Christian Wren Chapel. He reiterated his position that the cross remains unwelcoming to many in the College's community. Read the Emails and commentary at The Regents Voice.

Secularism Rewrites College History

2006-12-19T13:04:00.000-08:00

Near the end of October, university president Gene R. Nichol, of the College of William and Mary, made the unilateral and quiet decision to exile the cross from the altar of the historic Wren Chapel. The Wren Chapel is part of the Wren Building, which is the original academic building of the campus where Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe and James Madison received their higher education.

The College of William and Mary was established in 1693 by Royal Charter from the English King William and Queen Mary with the mission to train young men to be Anglican ministers. Naturally, a chapel would be part of such training. But Mr. Nichol believes that the cross is too potent a symbol of Christianity and produces an atmosphere of exclusion and insensitivity to members of the student body who are not Christians. Read The Cross and the Politics

The powers of the secularists are exercised to their fullest on this campus and the president's decision to remove the cross until it is asked for is the latest assault on American history. The SaveTheWrenCross.org has an online petition requesting that Mr. Nichol reverse his decision. This website also provides facts and information, articles and opinions about this issue.

2006 Mid-Term Elections: The People Have Spoken

2006-11-08T16:00:00.000-08:00

So now you have it. The Democratic Party has taken not the 15 seats it needed for control of the House, but at least 26 in the midterm elections of 2006. Technically, the Senate is still up for grabs but the Democrats need only two more seats to win control of the Senate. The last two holdouts are Montana and Virginia with a Democratic win projected for Montana. The race between Senator George Allen (R-VA) and James Webb is terribly tight and could end up in a recount. If so, we won’t know if the Democrats control the Senate until after the recount which will happen November 27. Regardless, I strongly suspect I will be sending my petitions to Senator Webb.

The GOP expected to lose some seats in both Houses of Congress but it did not expect such wholesale rejection. Superficial punditry, such as that expressed in today’s New York Times editorial page, explains the turnover as “an angry shout of repudiation of the Bush White House and the abysmal way the Republican majority has run Congress. The Republicans,” the editorial rants, “created their defeat by focusing obsessively on the right-wing ‘base,’ ostracizing not only the Democrats but their own party’s more moderate legislators.” The dissatisfaction of many Americans with the Administration’s handling of the war in Iraq and the Congressional handling of high-stakes issues such as illegal immigration, social security and health care was the impetus for the decision of many voters to give the other side a chance. But the ways,or non-ways that the Republican Congress handled these issues is reflective of a deeper problem in the GOP. I believe the GOP got the boot not because of its “obsession with the right-wing base,” but because it disappointed this huge conservative constituency.

The conservative Republican juggernaut that squashed the forty-year Democratic control of Congress back in 1994 succeeded because of its promise to govern on Reagan’s conservative principles. Limited government, tax reduction, deregulation, protection of the unborn, heading off activist judges, family values, property rights and national defense, that led to two landslide victories for President Reagan, are still part of the political psyche of a majority of Americans. But now, twelve years on, the people that the Newt Gingrich crowd tossed out have themselves become those people: straining to hold power for power’s sake, corruption, and frivolous spending. There are too many scandals for the Party of Values. There is too much pork for the Party of Fiscal Responsibility. There has been too much compromising of its own principles in order to hang on to power. It's not that the Republican Party in general has been more corrupt than its Democratic counterpart--it hasn't by far--but there is not much room for error if, having run on a platform against the excesses of past Democratic Congresses and administrations, you screw up. In short, the Republican Party has “lost its Reaganite soul” explained conservative leader Brent Bozell at a news conference that aired on CSPAN this morning.

It's too bad the Republican Party has lost the Congress because it has mainly been the GOP that has stood for conservative prinicples, even if it failed these last few years. I am for conservative governance and for whichever party wants to take it on, but I have no confidence in the party of San Francisco values. And conservatism is becoming a sour taste in the mouths of moderate citizens of all political persuasions because the GOP has strayed so far from the Reagan foundation.

So what are the conservatives to do? First, they should distance themselves from the Republican Party until the Party is willing to get back to the basics. Conservatives need to work with Democrats and Independents who share the same values in order to effect real and lasting change—to achieve a new “morning in America.” This is going to be hard for the next two years but when the voters see the mess the left is going to create for them, they will be eager to come back to the truely repentent Republican fold in 2008, if indeed the GOP has gotton it together by then.

Reagan was the eternal optimist and had all confidence that the American people, when faced with a choice, would always pick the right one. And in a convoluted sense, the American people have made the right choice in this election. If the Republican Party does not change its ways it deserves to fade into the sunset of a bygone era. If the GOP “returns to its Reagan roots, embraces the common sense principles and values” that most of America still believes in, then the party of “San Francisco Values” will be a blip on the radar screen of American governance.

keywords: midterm, mid-term, mid term, elections, Republicans, house, senate, majority

New York Times Breathlessly Reports: The Economy Is Taking A Dive

2006-11-07T13:28:00.000-08:00

I’ll keep my thoughts on the "cooling economy" short and sweet since I know you’re anxious to get to the polls armed with this information.

The New York Times: With a theatric wag of the head and a practiced darkened brow, the New York Times reported the hopeless inevitability of the coming recession: “The latest information about the economy leaves no question that it has slowed down by just about every measure — housing and manufacturing, retail sales and job growth, and others.”

The inconvenient truth: Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said today that home sales and prices may continue to slide for some time, but the broader U.S. economy appears poised for a rebound. "It looks as though the worst is behind us" in terms of the effect of the housing slump on economic growth, the retired Fed chief told financial advisers at a conference in Washington organized by a division of Charles Schwab & Co.

The New York Times: "Even the recent increase in compensation is generally believed to be a sign of coming layoffs, not a harbinger of wage inflation," yip yapped the Times.

The inconvenient truth: The Labor Department reported that wages have increased at quadruple the rate of worker productivity. Labor productivity increased at 1.6% while wages jumped 4.9% second quarter 2006. Far from being a sign of coming layoffs, these numbers reveal quite a tight labor market. To wit: the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in October that 92,000 new jobs were added and the unemployment rate declined to 4.4%. This is the lowest rate since 2001 and even lower than the comparable period of the 1990’s expansion when the rate dropped to 4.6%. But wait! 92,000 is not the 125,000 new jobs predicted by Wall Street, shrieked the Democrats. Yet, the same Democrats failed to even whisper that the totals for the two previous months were revised upward by 139,000.

The New York Times: "As for the recent improvement in the unemployment rate, sorry to say, it’s an aberration. The job market won’t turn up in any meaningful way when the overall direction of the economy is down," insists the Times despite all facts to the contrary.

The inconvenient...OK you get the point: The slowdown in new housing construction and auto sales reduced jobs in manufacturing and construction, but gains in the service sector have taken up the slack. Non-farm payrolls have increased by 470,000 in the last three months and by 1.9 million this past year. Far from an economic contraction, the increase in wages over productivity brings inflationary pressure. Inflation means more money chasing the existing goods, hence forcing prices higher. Low levels of inflation such as we have now, are indicative of a strong, growing economy, not a threatened one.

The New York Times: “Most Americans are ill prepared for an economic deceleration, even if it ends in a soft landing. When economic basics like income and insurance coverage are taken into account, most working families are no better off now than they were when the economic expansion began in late 2001. They have been held back, primarily, by lousy pay. In 26 of the past 30 months, wages for most of the work force have failed to outpace inflation, even as corporate profits have hit historical highs.”

It’s a weirdly inconsistent editorial position for the Times to admit to an economic expansion in 2001 since that was the start of the Bush tax cuts. I guess the economy expanded as much as the Times needed to "prove" that working families, and who isn’t working except the limousine liberals at the Times, are no better off five years later, especially with the key mid-term elections. Getting back to the point, the tight labor market in the U.S. has historically yielded rising wages and incomes. And, according to labor statistics as reported by the Wall Street Journal, average hourly earnings have been rising at a 4% annual rate for the past six months. With the price of oil and gasoline falling, real purchasing power will probably increase. Real wages have climbed by 2.4% over the last 12 months, outpacing inflation. So even with the recent decline in new home sales that reduced the GDP by 1% in the third quarter, the strong job and wage growth strongly suggests that the economy is continuing to grow. And even the New York Times might not want to be so quick to condemn, even if only by implication, corporate profits. After all, its corporate profits that motivate corporations to expand and create new jobs.

Being John Kerry's Apology

2006-11-02T15:25:00.000-08:00

On being John Kerry's apology:

“As a combat veteran,
(three long months of medal mongering and all I got was this lousy hole in my a--)

I want to make it clear to anyone in uniform
(you losers)
and to their loved ones:
(dregs of society, vote for me!)

my poorly stated joke
(puhlease stop, don’t tawk, go home, wind-surf, blow-dry your hair, anything just stop, stop it right now—GET OUT OF MY HEAD, IMUS!)

at a rally was not about, and never intended to refer to any
(stupe)
troop.”

I sincerely regret
(do you doubt my word, Klingon?)
that my words were misinterpreted
(what a bunch of stupids—we have a place in Iraq for them and for…...YOU)
(vote for me!)

to wrongly imply anything negative about those in uniform,
(Winter Soldier? I don’t know no steenkin' winter soldier)

and I personally apologize
(over the internet because the cameras just can’t catch my ‘sincere’ side)

to any service member, family member, or American
(Islamo-fascist jihadists rejoice)
who was offended.
(Sheez, thick enough for ya, Murtha? Now lets get down to the real reason I’m here)

It is clear the Republican Party would rather talk about anything
(like the price of oil dropping a whole bunch, inflation being under control, unemployment at 4.8%, the stock market breaking the all time record high that happened under Clinton, long term bonds rallying, the housing market still going strong, GDP continuing to grow thanks to the tax cuts)

but their failed security policy.
(David Limbaugh, Rush Limbaugh, Anne Coulter, Rick Santorum, David Horowitz, Rich Lowry, Sean Hannity, Lisa Mount and all the rest of you right-wing-nut jobs keep your doughy lips from flapping about how there have been no new terrorist attacks on our soil during the Bush administration. Oh, and for crying out loud, stop reminding everybody about Clinton’s policy of paying protection money to Kim Jung Il)

I don’t want my verbal (Freudian) slip to be a diversion from the real issues.
(like George Allen using a made up word to describe a pest on Jimmy Webb's staff. Profuse, humble and sincere apologizing is just a diversion from the real issues, like all you people being stupid. Oooohhh I botched it!)

I will continue to fight for a change
(I learned to fight in Vietnam, but I’m not here to talk about Vietnam, I won three purple hearts, a silver this and a bronze that in Vietnam, I jumped up and down to heave 'em over a fence. Vietnam, Vietnam, Vietnam)

to provide real security for our country
(like crowning the UN king over America)

and a winning strategy for our troops."
(note to self: learn how to play "Settlers of Katan")

And the Braying Donkey Award Goes to: John Kerry

2006-11-01T16:12:00.000-08:00

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven—including braying like a jackass. It seems that the Senator John Kerry never misses an opportunity to disappoint his terrestrial purpose. He has, once again, blatted his way to incredibility:

"Education," Mr. Kerry told a rally at Pasadena City College October 30th for Phil Angelides , the Democratic candidate for governor of California, "if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq." Nice.

Jonah Goldberg of the National Review Online thinks it’s obvious that Mr. Kerry’s idiot comment was indeed just “a botched joke about the president and the president’s people,” his innocent intention only to malign the intelligence and diligence of the President and his administration.

Mr. Kerry, your Freudian slip is showing.

Kerry was addressing students at the Pasadena City College rally, so who else could he have been talking about but members of the military who are stuck in Iraq because they must be junior high school dropouts? How could a man who is a veteran himself, we've heard many a time, say such irresponsible and dangerous things about his younger band of brothers (and sisters)?

This bad-mouthing is nothing new for the Senator. Let’s take a look at some of the barbarous comments he has made about his fellow American soldiers in his own past. Going back to April 22, 1971 Kerry, in his highly controversial Winter Soldier testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said that US servicemen in Vietnam were sent "to die for the biggest nothing in history," alleged that the military had "created a monster" of mindlessly violent American soldiers that “raped, cut off ears, cut off [the] heads" of Vietnamese citizens, and inflicted terror across Vietnam "razing villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan." Fast forward to December 6, 2005 and we find the same John Kerry accusing, without proof, American troops “of going into the homes of Iraqis in the dead of night, terrorizing kids and children, you know, women…” said in a CBS "Face the Nation" discussion with host Bob Schieffer.

But just for grins, let’s say Kerry’s laughable attempt at plausible deniability really is a “botched joke.” In this case, he has effectively said that he is smarter and better educated than the President. But let’s take a look at some inconvenient truths. First, both Bush and Kerry went to Yale. Bush got better grades than Kerry. Bush went on to Harvard for his MBA. During the Vietnam War, both Naval officer Kerry and Air National Guardsman Bush took I.Q. tests which measured Bush's I.Q. a few points higher than Kerry's, according to NewsMax.com. If Mr. Kerry is saying that Bush got us stuck in Iraq because he failed to do his homework, Kerry might want to stop telling everyone that he voted for the invasion (until he "voted against it" whenever that was).

But don't listen to me. Listen to his fellow veteran Senator John McCain, who spent a much longer and more terrible time in Vietnam than Kerry did. Senator McCain has demanded that Mr. Kerry apologize to our troops for such a prejudicial—and wrong—assessment. The Washington Times, referencing a Heritage Foundation study, reported that U.S. recruits are better educated than the average American of the same age. 98 percent of U.S. military recruits have a high-school education or G.E.D while 75 percent of civilian Americans in the same age group do. The addition-and-subtraction-challenged Yale-educated Senator can do the math.

To White House Press Secretary Tony Snow and everyone else who dared to characterize Kerry's clumsy comment for what it is--a knee-jerk addition to a long string of "negative comments" about the military--Kerry delivered this thoughtful response: “I’m not going to be lectured by a stuffed-suit White House mouthpiece standing behind a podium. ... It disgusts me that these Republican hacks, who have never worn the uniform of our country, lie and distort so blatantly and carelessly about those who have. ... Bottom line, these Republicans want to debate straw men because they’re afraid to debate real men.” That ought to learn ya! Well, at least "these Republicans" are smart enough to know that America has the best-trained, most professional and most well-educated military in the world.

Mr. Kerry yip yaps that its unfair to be called to account for his misfired "joke." To him, Republican harpies are taking advantage of the donkey fodder because they are unable and unwilling to talk about "real issues." But this is a real issue. Kerry's comments betray a deeply entrenched contempt for our military. This contempt rendered aid and comfort to our Viet Cong enemies, and will render aid and comfort to our terrorist enemies. What better way to weaken our military than to undermine the morale and motivation of our troops, since the war itself isn't? Maybe this is Kerry's grand plan to get us out of Iraq. Beware, the bad guys are hearing it too.

The Democrats want the Congress in 2006. John Kerry wants to be Commander-in-Chief in 2008. Can America trust its national security to such a man and his party? America did not think so in 2004. And now, two years on, the Democrats have demonstrated a weak-minded “cut-and-run” mentality that remains unworthy of America’s confidence in 2006 and 2008.

Should Hastert Resign Over Foley's Foibles?

2006-10-07T06:33:00.000-07:00

HASTERT SAYS HE WON'T STEP ASIDE OVER FOLEY SCANDAL
House Speaker Dennis Hastert on Thursday said that he has "done nothing wrong" and that he will not step down over the controversy surrounding former Rep. Mark Foley. read more
______________________________________________

When I was still with the State Department, a former supervisor, who was also a reserve colonel in the Air Force, told me that in the military the superior officer was responsible for the actions of his subordinate—I assumed this meant while on the job. He applied this same management philosophy to the civilian workplace but with the added restriction that the so-called team leader had no authority to force the team members, i.e. subordinates, to do anything.

“But what about insubordination?” I asked. “The team leader can give well thought out directions that anticipate everything that can go wrong and the subordinate can still choose to disregard them. The only way to prevent this is for the supervisor to stand watch over the subordinate every second to make sure the job gets done right. In that case it’s better to spell team with an I.” The superior officer should not and cannot be held responsible for every action of the subordinate, but only for how his decisions affect the performance of the subordinate. And that should be judged based on the information that was available to the superior at the time. Anything beyond that would be unjust.

That said, how much responsibility does the Speaker of the House actually assume when members behave badly? The Speaker of the House has several roles: the institutional role of presiding officer and administrative head of the House, the partisan leader of the majority party in the House and the representative role of an elected Member of the House. The Constitution does not describe the office of the Speaker or his duties, nor was there any significant discussion of the office during the Constitutional Convention. But the apparent perception is that the Speaker does have authority over members. For example, State Senator Tom Kean Jr., New Jersey Republican, who is running for the Senate, called yesterday for Mr. Hastert to resign the speakership, saying, "He is the head of that institution, and this happened on his watch…”

Legally, it doesn’t look like the Speaker has the power to unilaterally remove a congressman from office, even someone like the erstwhile congressman Foley. What the Speaker can do is unleash the House Ethics Committee to investigate members who have broken the rules that regulate the behavior that is considered ethical for members. Depending on its findings, the Committee can then issue certain disciplinary actions like censure or expulsion. Criminal investigations may or not happen at the request of the Speaker or the Committee.

Hastert and members of the Congressional Page Program did confront Foley and if he had obeyed the Speaker’s orders to stop contact with the pages none of this mess would be happening now. But since Foley continued unrepentent and surreptitiously, holding Hastert directly responsible for the activities of this middle-aged man is unjust. The Democrats counter by insisting that Foley’s activities “were an open secret in Congress.” If this is true, why weren't the Democrats bellowing about sexual predators then? Ms. Pelosi’s yip-yapping about the Republican Party’s failure to “protect our children” should be understood for what it is: opportunistic and disingenuous. After all, if Hastert goes, Ms. Pelosi has a chance to grab his seat, no pun intended. If Hastert is responsible, then the entire Congress is responsible.

Seeking to escape their responsibility for this problem, the Democrats have been pushing the idea that Hastert did know about the iffy contact between Foley and the pages well before the 2005 episode. According to a Washington Post report: “House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert’s chief of staff confronted then-Rep. Mark Foley about his inappropriate social contact with male pages well before the speaker said aides in his office took any action, a current congressional staff member with personal knowledge of Foley and his behavior with pages said yesterday.” But until it’s proven, neither Hastert nor anyone else should step down.

Foley’s folly might have brought the smack down on Hastert's career and is likely to be terribly damaging to the election chances of senior and aspiring Republican campaigns. The poll taken by FoxNews suggests "Americans have bailed on the speaker." The Republican Party must show the voters that "something is being done," hence the vociferous demands of the both the left and the right for resignations. This is only a knee-jerk attempt to scrub the tarnish from the gleaming perception of the Party as the guardian of morals and family values. That “something” doesn’t have to be effective or even reasonable, just as long as it looks like someone is falling on his proverbial sword. But this is not due process and this tactic will fail because it just makes the whole Party look guilty. If Hastert bows to these pressures, the Democrats will be motivated to continue to search for more and more Republicans who “knew and did nothing” until they reach the logical extreme of every Republican having resigned his seat. And that would be ridiculous.

“How the mighty have fallen.” What was Foley thinking? Was the six-term winner bewitched by his own success and so enamored of his power that he figured any boy would feel privileged for his attentions, no matter how gross or illegal? Who else in Congress is self-deluded into believing he is above such petty things as ethics or the law? Congress has been “ex-Foley-ated” as one clever blogger put it, and hopefully this is a lesson to any elected would-be criminals.

Mark Foley Fiasco

2006-10-04T04:01:00.000-07:00

DID DEMOCRATS PAGE MARK FOLEY?
Scandal: Right after Mark Foley was revealed to have had inappropriate e-mail conversations with a 16-year-old page, he resigned and checked into rehab. Now, what did Democrats know, and when did they know it? read
________________________________________

The Democrats finally met a sex scandal they didn’t like, and at a fortuitous time too. With the President’s approval ratings on the rise, a strong economy, strong national security, gas prices dropping, a booming stock market and less than five weeks until mid-term elections, a good scandal is just the shot in the arm the Democratic Party needs. So, it’s not surprising that House Minority Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has issued a loud summons for a full investigation of Republican leadership by the Ethics Committee and demanded House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s resignation: “Republican Leaders admitted to knowing about Mr. Foley’s abhorrent behavior for six months to a year and failed to protect the children in their trust. Republican Leaders must be investigated by the Ethics Committee and immediately questioned under oath.”

Could Minority Speaker Pelosi right? Even The Washington Times’ and some conservative groups have called for Dennis Hastert’s resignation. The conservative Times is generally fair-minded in due process but the October 3rd editorial was quick to denounce Hastert as either “grossly negligent” or that “he deliberately looked the other way.” Neither assessment is fair. The Republican leaders have said they knew a year ago about the so-called “overly friendly” instant messages where the erstwhile congressman asked the former page for a picture of himself. At that time, Speaker Hastert, Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) and other members of the Congressional Page Program cornered Foley about the iffy messages and told him to stop all contact with the former page and to watch his conduct around the current pages, according to CNN . Foley agreed and I believe that Hastert et al thought the problem was solved. These emails, though questionable, are not illegal because they did not solicite sex. Hastert said he knew nothing about the sexually explicit and disgusting emails—which do amount to the solicitation of a minor—of 2003 prior to ABC News’ release of the emails last week. There is no reason at this time to doubt his word.

On the flip side, I can understand why the Times has been so quick to condemn the chain of command for one man's error. War is hell and given the stakes of this year’s elections—15 house seats and 6 senate seats up for grabs—we shouldn't be surprised that the Democrats would take advantage of the opportunity to exploit this scandal. So, according to some Democratic strategists, Mr. Foley’s indiscretions are representative of the immoral slurry of the entire Republican Party; never mind that perverts come in all shapes, sizes and political affiliations.

While the Democratic Party tends to promote what the majority of people see as immoral behavior in the name of constitutional freedom and sloth and underclass in the name of compassion, the Republican Party is perceived as taking a stand for foundational and social values. The Washington Times then is understandably concerned with the reputation of the Party and believes it necessary to remove everyone who has been tainted by Foley's actions, whether or not it's fair. As the Times puts it: “…are we at The Times right to ask that the Republican Party hold itself to a higher standard of morality and leadership?” Mr. Foley’s highly suspect communications with underage boys, especially while being a co-chair of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, has seriously embarrassed the Republican Party. Mr. Foley’s actions may even tip the balance in favor of the Democrats.

Despite the shrill cries of “cover-up,” Mr. Foley immediately resigned upon disclosure, checked into rehab and good riddance. The Republican leadership was quick to condemn Mr. Foley and to start investigations on the violations of any sexual predator laws, both federal and state. But Ms. Pelosi et al shriek that not enough is being done. This is hypocrisy at its finest, maybe overshadowing Mr. Foley’s hypocrisy. Let's examine some history. What did the Democratic Party controlled Congress of 1983 do when it had to deal with its own Congressional page sexual scandal? That’s right, nothing new about congressional interest in pages. The House Ethics Committee had concluded that two members, Daniel Crane (R-IL) and Gerry Studds (D-Mass), had sex (they didn't just write notes) with 17 year old congressional pages. In Crane's case, it was a 1980 relationship with a female page and in Studds' case, it was a 1973 relationship with male page. Both representatives plead guilty to the charges but Congress only censured them. Censure requires the guilty party to stand in the well of the House and be publicly reprimanded. However, the then Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-GA) said not enough had been done and recommended expulsion, but his recommendation was ignored. Crane, who subsequently apologized for his transgression, lost his bid for reelection in 1984. Studds on the other hand, insisted that his relationship with the page was legal and private and refused to apologize for his behavior. He even turned his back and ignored the censure being read to him. He continued to be reelected until his retirement in 1996, according to ABC News.

How about Barney Frank (D-Mass)? Back in the mid 1980s, the openly gay congressman paid Stephen Gobie for sex and Gobie ran a prostitution ring out of Rep. Frank’s Georgetown apartment. Frank did not resign his position; he was not even censured by Congress. In fact, Mr. Frank is still working as the Democratic representative from Massachusetts.

Or how about that Bill Clinton? True, he and Ms. Lewinski were both consenting adults, but he took advantage of his power position and then lied about it under oath.

I don’t think the Washington Times needs to worry if the Republicans can hold on to their reputation for higher standards of morality and integrity.

Notwithstanding all of the above, what is surreal to me about the whole Foley fiasco is the timing of these sordid revelations. That Mr. Foley’s questionable behavior toward minors came to light and been swiftly dealt with was necessary regardless of the timing, but I can’t help asking who had this information and when did they have it. Did someone choose to save this information for disclosure to ABC News at a critical election time rather than report it to the proper authorities? Could someone at ABC News have held it for similar reasons instead of giving it to the House Ethics Committee? If either case is true, it sounds like obstruction of justice to me.

A few days ago a Fox News anchor suggested that Congress has become “more moral” over the decades, opposite to where society is going. I don’t think so. If Foley had been a Democrat, I doubt he would have had to resign. Nothing has changed in Congress. Partisanship is still every bit as opportunistic as it has always been.